Two At Sea

May, 2012

We’re trying to slow down a bit, which goes against our instincts. We need to slow down to try to make it to the east end of Hiva Oa at about 7AM on Friday. We want daylight for what should be a spectacular 20 mile ride to the bay where we’ll anchor. Along the way we should be treated to lush green volcanic peaks, some 3500 feet high. I can’t wait! I’m also sorry to see the passage coming to an end.

Last night was one of our most beautiful at-sea nights.  I woke Cyndi to see an almost perfectly horizontal Cheshire grin of a moon setting with Venus right along side.  The sky was filled with stars and so was the sea.  The stars in the sea were from bio-luminescence, plankton that gives off light when disturbed.  Normally, it’s millions of tiny, tiny lights that form a cloud of green glow.  Last night it was fewer, larger, individual flashes.  Sometimes there was what seemed to be a cluster that would light up Frisbee-sized disk of water off to the side or back of the boat.  These flashes were intensely bright green.  In the distance, small breaking waves would glow with bio-luminescence.  There was a nice warm breeze – the temperature dropped enough to cool us down from the hot day.  Our bellies were full of a great fish dinner.

We caught that fish the day before. It was a nice sized Mahi Mahi – maybe three and a half feet long. We have had fish for every meal since then.  Last night it was grilled fish with canned green beans. This morning, it’ll be fish and eggs, again. We are really hoping to catch one more fish before we head into the anchorage.  It’ll be nice to be able to prepare a few meals on a boat that isn’t rolling like a mechanical bull.  Hey, wouldn’t that make a great cooking channel show?  Iron Chefs on a Bull! “Stephanie, this will be difficult – he’ll prepare crepes while the bull is set at 9. I don’t think it’s been done before.”  Alternatively, how about “Iron Chefs on a 38 Foot Boat.” I’d watch that.

OK, I see I’ve been at sea too long. That’ll change soon enough. -Rich

This is what happened as some of the squalls passed. Sometimes, they’d change the wind direction. We use a device that steers the boat by the wind and we’d end up with a path like this documented on our chart plotter.

May 20, 2012

Cyndi: As we approached the time of our equator crossing, it had become apparent that it would be a nighttime event, around 9 or 10pm, and I was feeling a little disappointed. All the pictures I have seen of other boats crossing have been taken during the day; so that’s just what I’ve always pictured. Even more concerning was that this would take place during Rich’s watch, at a time when I am asleep. He has been promising “surprises,” the kind of surprises that I might not enjoy. I knew that if this took place on my watch, while he’s asleep, then I could keep an eye on him, waking him up just before the event. But now it would happen during my sleep, leaving him lots of dangerous free time.

Rich: It’s kind of a tradition to torture people as they go across the equator on a boat for the first time. Before you cross, you’re a pollywog. After the crossing, and ensuing “hazing” ceremony, you’re a shellback. Cyndi and I were both pollywogs. I’d been across on a big ship a couple of times, but I ducked out of the ceremony saying something like, “me, oh no, I’ve been across the line lots of times!” I left the rubbing on of the blue goo (that I’m pretty sure included spoiled fish guts) to other suckers. It was our turn now.

Cyndi: I woke up about half an hour before we were to cross and got ready, putting on enough clothes so I could be in pictures and getting the rum out, a special bottle that friends gave us for this occasion (thanks Stacy and Ramiro!) Rich was in the galley, and I had mixed feelings when I spotted the “surprise.” Rich had taken 3 Oreos and topped them with spray cheese (that stuff in a can that squirts through a nozzle). That concoction is an old joke between us stemming from a previous passage where I woke to find Rich having this as a snack and thought he’d lost his mind. He thought it would be fitting for our crossing. I was relieved that this wasn’t a messy kind of surprise that would leave me needing a shower, but I was dreading that I might actually have to eat one of these things.

Rich: OK, so most the hazing turned out to be psychological torture. I’m sure Neptune would approve. And I’ve got to say, those cookies and “cheese” were really pretty bad. Much worse than my memory. Maybe I had gone a little round-the-bend on that previous passage when I thought they were a really neat idea.

Cyndi: We headed into the cockpit with the cookie things, three shots of rum (one for each of us and one for King Neptune) and our empty wine bottle with a note. We had a little time to sit and enjoy the night. It had a tropical feeling, with a warm, light breeze and a zillion stars in the sky above us. I realized that this was the perfect way for us to cross, much nicer than under the afternoon sun.

When the time came, we threw the bottle over, toasted our crossing and becoming “Shellbacks,” threw a shot of rum to King Neptune, then proceeded to sip our own rum. Wow, that rum was good; King Neptune should be really happy with us! I was really enjoying this, sipping excellent rum under a starry night sky, when Rich said we now have to eat the cookies. He threw one to poor King Neptune then had one himself. I took a nibble, avoiding the cheese, but I could still smell it and that smell did not go well with Oreos. Rich told me to have another bite, but I told him I distinctly heard King Neptune wishing he could have another and quickly threw it over. Thankfully Rich didn’t object. I figure if King Neptune gets a whole shot of that wonderful rum, he can take care of this cookie thing for me.

We lingered outside, finishing our drinks. I could have sat out there for hours, but we needed to run the engine and charge up the boat’s batteries, plus I needed to get some more sleep before my watch. In all, it turned out to be a really nice, mellow crossing.

Rich: This is the first I’m hearing about Cyndi avoiding the cheese topping. I think King Neptune might not be quite done with her after all. We shall see. By the way, the bottle had kind of the traditional “Dropped in the sea at position… by the crew of Legacy…” kind of note. We also included a little money as a gift for who ever might find it. It’s kind of fun for us to think about this bottle with it’s contained cash washing ashore in some small, poor village in South America, but I guess it’s just as likely to be picked up by a overweight, cigar-puffing, speedo-clad Malibu beach-walker and ultimately ending up stuffed in a strippers thong. Oh well, I’m sure she (or he) can use the cash.

May 18, 2012

I was sound asleep and I think I was dreaming, but I don’t exactly remember. I do remember that it was a very good sleep and a fitting reward for how hard I’d worked at falling to sleep. It was about 11AM and I’d gotten off watch at 10. “Rich, Rich, there’s a helicopter, wake up!” A what? I sat up and looked out the companion way door, and there really was a helicopter – about 50 feet behind our boat and about 30 feet above the water. What the heck? I grabbed some shorts and the hand-held VHF radio and ran out into the cockpit.

I tried calling him while he circled our boat about three times. I was so busy looking at the radio and calling I didn’t really see the pilot. Cyndi did, and apparently he’d circled her once before I got out there, pausing behind the boat and waving. We weren’t able to make radio contact and after the circles, he sped off to the south.

I tried calling on the boat’s VHF… “this is the sailing vessel Legacy at position da, da de da, to the ship that launched the helicopter. Come in please.” No reply. I tried about three times, still no reply. What was it? A James Bond super yacht, a secret military settlement out at sea, a huge toy company sparing no expense to get me back to the states to design the next future recycle bin offering? Or maybe a fishing boat with a scout helicopter. Yea, that’s probably it. There are tuna boats in San Diego with helicopters on the back decks. Maybe it was one of those. About 20 minutes later, we heard a radio call but it was weak and we were never able to establish radio communications. (Aviation buffs: it looked like it might have been an R44, but somehow it looked sleeker and more bullet-shaped. It had great big things attached to the skids that I assume inflate in a water landing.)

But how strange. We’re so far from anywhere. It’s well over 2000 miles to Central America, Mexico or even Hawaii. I guess the closest place to us at this point is the Marquesas at only about 865 miles away.

We’re almost across the ITCZ tonight. We’ve only been in it about 24 hours and I expect we’ll come out of it later tonight. It hasn’t been too bad. It was rainy all day today and last night we had dozens of rain squalls. The squalls didn’t have a lot of wind. In fact, they mostly stole what little wind we had. Cyndi thought she saw one lightning flash. I didn’t see any. Sometimes there can be a lot of thunder and lightning in the ITCZ so we count ourselves lucky. Lightning? What could go wrong there with nothing sticking up in the air, save for our 65 foot tall metal mast (and oh yea, an occasional helicopter).

We have about 240 miles to the equator where by the tradition, our current status as polliwogs will change to that of shell-backs. We have an appropriate celebration planned. We’ll tell you about it in a couple of days. Cyndi reads these and I don’t want to spoil the surprise. -Rich

Cyndi’s Version: I was comfortably settled into the watch chair, the boat motoring along in these rather surreal, gray and humid ITCZ conditions. I had been on watch about an hour and was deep into my book when I heard what sounded like a gas-powered lawn mower come to life in the cockpit. To say I was alarmed would be an understatement, as I rushed to the companionway, fearing that our transmission or engine was in a state of complete self-destruction, a pieces-flying-everywhere sort of catastrophe.

I came pretty much face to face with a helicopter, which had come down to what looked like 50 feet behind our boat and about 20 or 30 feet above the water, hovering and looking almost like he might be going for a water landing. To say I was surprised would be another understatement; I don’t think I would have been any more surprised to see a Kraken. I was dumbfounded, probably standing there with my mouth open.

Possible reasons for his being here flashed through my mind: does he think we’re a boat in distress and is coming in for a rescue? Is he checking to see if we might be drug runners? Is he coming to warn us of some impending doom up ahead, a freak weather condition or natural disaster? I could see the pilot clearly now as he hovered behind us, and he waved at me. I waved back, still stunned, but realizing if he’s giving me a wave that there’s probably no emergency.

I had stayed in the companionway, not wanting to run out in the cockpit as I was only in underwear and a tank top (it’s warm here and we’re not wearing a lot). I decided the next thing to do was to get Rich up, and I was surprised when he sprang out of bed, believing me about the helicopter right away. I was relieved he was up fast enough to see it for himself as I’m not sure he would have believed this otherwise, thinking I’d been at sea too long and was starting to hallucinate. As he tried to radio the helicopter or the ship it came from, I recovered from the shock and thought about the moral of this story: don’t assume people can’t drop in on you out here. Also, when taking showers in the cockpit, keep your ears perked for approaching aircraft and a towel close at hand.

One final note: I’m not very happy to hear about a surprise for the equator crossing. Those kinds of surprises are along the lines of the surprises involved in fraternity hazing rituals. I was hoping to enjoy my rum in peace, without being subjected to an involuntary King Neptune shaving cream beard application or some other indignity. Sigh. -Cyndi